"I am sure, unless you give the instructions quickly, that I shall
shoot," she interrupted him. Her voice was so quiet that Peter was
amazed. "I'm sorry, Mrs. Keith. But--"

A flash of fire blinded him, and with the flash Blake staggered back with
a cry of pain and stood swaying unsteadily in the starlight, clutching
with one hand at an arm which hung limp and useless at his side.

"That time, I broke your arm," said Dolores, with scarcely more
excitement than if she had made a bull's-eye on the Piping Rock range.
"If I fire again, I am quite positive that I shall kill you!"

The Eskimos had not moved. They were like three lifeless, staring
gargoyles. For another second or two Blake stood clutching at his arm.
Then he said,

"Uppy, put the dog meat and the kindlings on the big sledge--and drive
like hell for Fort Confidence!" And then, before she could stop him, he
followed up his words swiftly and furiously in Eskimo.

"Stop!"

She almost shrieked the one word of warning, and with it a second shot
burned its way through the flesh of Blake's shoulder and he went down.
The revolver turned on Uppy, and instantly he was electrified into life.
Thirty seconds later, at the head of the team, he was leading the way out
into the chaotic gloom of the night. Hovering over Peter, riding with her
hand on the gee-bar of the sledge, Dolores looked back to see Blake
staggering to his feet. He shouted after them, and what he said was in
Uppy's tongue. And this time she could not stop him.